


Stitches

by frodo (ringbearer)



Series: Red Ribbon [2]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Death, F/M, Love, Reylo - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:29:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21987433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ringbearer/pseuds/frodo
Summary: Rey died at the Battle of Exegol. Now Ben is left with nothing except a ghost and his grief.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Series: Red Ribbon [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1582738
Comments: 3
Kudos: 34





	Stitches

**Author's Note:**

> *babu frik voice* HEY HEY!!!!!! i had another idea!! listen to stay with me by clint mansell while reading to make yourself cry.

_Be with me…_

_Be with me…_

_Ben…_

Ben Solo started violently awake, the last vestiges of his agonizing dream leaving him as he sucked in a sharp breath and sat bolt upright in bed, his bare chest heaving. He was covered in a cold sweat, his hair hanging in wet strings around his face. He was shaking so hard he almost seemed to vibrate, his blankets kicked down into a bundle near the end of his bed.

Slowly, he seemed to remember where he was and, slowly, he pulled his legs closer to his chest, resting his elbows on his knees as he put his head in his hands.

This time when he shook it was from silent sobs.

And a desperate unending desire to turn back time and change what could not be changed. Fix what could not be fixed. And make his excruciating dreams a beautiful reality.

It had been just shy of a week since the end of the war, since he’d come to Ajan Kloss, since he’d climbed out of the ruined Temple of the Sith on Exegol with the body of Rey Palpatine in his arms, silent tears running down his impassive face.

She had disappeared not too long later, giving herself over completely to the Force.

Lost to him forever.

He shuddered violently

He didn’t even get a chance to bury her.

It had been lucky for him, he supposed, that Finn and Poe trusted him when they saw him with Rey and assumed it hadn’t been he who killed her. She’d died of exhaustion, he’d said, but he felt they really only believed that because there was nothing on her marking that she’d died from anything else.

He wished more than anything they’d killed him right then.

It had been bad enough to climb up out of the pit Palpatine had thrown him into to see her lying dead amid the dust and stone, but it had been so very much worse to attempt to bring her back, to give his life force for hers, and have nothing happen.

He’d held her in his arms, rocking her, his face pressed first into her hair and then the hollow of her neck as he sobbed, mourning all he’d lost, regretting all the time he’d spent fighting her, all the time he’d spent denying who he truly was.

And now she was gone.

His fingers, still pressed against his face, curled against his skin.

He’d lost her.

He’d been too weak.

And far, far too late.

“Ben.”

The voice was soft, gentle, coming from the corner of the room he’d been given on Ajan Kloss.

He knew what he would see even before he lifted his head.

She was there, dressed in the clothes she’d died in, looking as beautiful as she had in life.

The sight made Ben shudder again, looking away out his window at the verdant planet beyond.

It was too painful to see her now, knowing he could not touch her, could not hold her.

Could not kiss her. Nor love her.

She was as unreachable to him in death as she had been in life.

If not moreso.

At least in life when they’d been apart, he could see her, speak to her, even touch her. They could pass things to one another through the dyad they’d shared. That they still shared.

At least in his dreams he could hold her and kiss her, tell her how much he loved her over and over again until she grew sick of the words. And it was enough. In dreaming, it was enough because he didn’t know any better. He didn’t know that it was little more than a wonderful lie, conjured by his grief stricken mind. He did not know that when he woke it would all be taken from him.

Because now all he could do was speak to her.

And it was not enough. It was nowhere near enough.

And it never would be.

“Rey,” he finally replied, his voice ragged and quiet. “What are you doing here?”

“Ben,” she said again, her voice just as soft as before. “You still cry when you wake up.”

He swallowed hard. Out the window, he could see people milling about, going about their daily lives. They’d all been awake a lot longer than he had. He knew many of them had lost loved ones in the war, but still he could not imagine they understood the depth of his grief.

None of them had been a dyad.

And, whatever any of them believed, there was a difference.

“You’re not here,” he said in little more than a whisper. “Of course I awake in pain.”

Tears filled his eyes again. One ran down his cheek, almost directly down his scar.

The scar she’d given him.

He wanted to tear off the skin of his face.

“Ben.”

Her voice was closer this time, almost right next to him.

He felt her fingers – thin, more air than any real substance – brush his hair back from his face.

He closed his eyes slowly and swallowed again. He didn’t turn. To see her this close and be unable to touch her would fracture what little was left of him.

“Rey, please,” the raggedness returning to his voice.

“You think this doesn’t hurt me too?” she gasped. He sucked in a breath. He could almost feel her lips against his ear. “You think I don’t wish I were still with you?”

Now he did turn to her, staring at the blueish silver figure beside him, speaking through gritted teeth, trembling with sorrowful rage, “Then why did you leave? Why did you leave me, Rey? Why did you _abandon_ me?” He let out a scoff, turning away briefly to shake his head. “What did you think would happen?” He looked at her again. “That I would be fine? That I would _move on_? How could you possibly be so horribly naive?”

This time it was Rey who swallowed hard. “I didn’t want to leave you,” she answered, her voice still a whisper. “But...death isn’t a choice you make. It’s a decision, one I was no part of. I could either...stay in my body, trapped between then and now, but unable to do little more than exist halfway between worlds. Or I could deny the will of the Force and join it instead. I chose the latter.”

Ben looked away once more. He knew she was right. And he resented it.

It would be easier to blame her for this.

It would be easier to hate her and blame her and believe that it could’ve been stopped.

But he couldn’t hate her. And he couldn’t blame her.

She had given her life to save the galaxy from tyranny. He couldn’t blame her for that.

So he blamed himself.

And, truly, who else was there to blame?

“But it wasn’t your fault,” Rey replied, her voice close again, her dead lips against his ear once more. “You couldn’t have known. You couldn’t have stopped it. Palpatine was too strong.”

More tears filled his eyes and he grimaced, turning back to her. “But you’re still dead.”

This time Rey could only look at him, her own eyes swimming.

A different kind of grief ravaged her.

“Will I see you again?” Ben asked, sucking in a gasp, suddenly desperate. The tears in his eyes made tracks down his face.

The thought of losing her completely terrified him in ways he refused to admit to himself due to their blatantly stark realness.

At least now he could speak to her.

At least now he could see her.

At least now he could feel her in however small a way.

Rey leaned across the small space that separated them, kissing his cheek, her eyes closed.

In truth, they were separated by so much more than fabric and cloth.

“Always,” she whispered.

And then she was gone and he was alone once more.

He felt as though there were a gaping hole inside him, the place she had once occupied completely empty every time she left him, every time he woke, every time he realized again that she was gone.

Ben covered his face with his hands again and began to sob.

**Author's Note:**

> again i'm not sure i'll continue this. i really have no other ideas for it at present, but i'm happy with how this turned out.


End file.
